Sunday, March 15, 2015

If you don't know and swoon over this talented girl's quilts already, then you will in about two seconds, you will fall in love with her naturally dyed textiles, hand quilted designs and the Texan sun.

Maura has a wonderfully eclectic background from which she has created the world that is Folk Fibers, working in preschools,
organic farms, traveling America as well as study in Textile Design + Fiber Arts at Savannah College of
Art & Design. She recently lectured at Quiltcon 2015 and was the worthy recipient of the 2013 Martha Stewart Award.

We love Maura's passion and dedication to her craft, you can see here,
here & here on her blog, sharing the fascinating dye process with
her meticulous record keeping. Maura organically grows, harvests, and
forages for natural
dyes around Austin then uses 100% natural fibers to create gorgeous
solid colours (she loves them for their timeless appeal & so do we).
How rewarding it must feel to create an artwork from literally the
ground up.

All of Maura's quilts are hand stitched, and whilst knowing this does take more time she believes the heirloom results are valuable and worth it - a one of a kind beauty that can be passed down for generations.

A few years ago and again recently we have been trying our hands at using natural dye stuffs, like Australian Indigo, to create new backing cloths for our prints and can appreciate the time and commitment it takes to gather, simmer and steep. We are looking forward to learning everything we can about these processes and are grateful that Maura is so generous with her experience.

We saw this photo doing the rounds on Pinterest some time ago and love Maura's hand stitching with sashiko thread.

We love staring into this stunning quilt, imagine, all of those colours have been created naturally!

We also love Maura's hand made cedar boxes that carry her quilts. Cute logo.

Sunday, March 1, 2015

You will notice a few changes this year, we have been listening to your feedback and think we have a fair and awesome challenge.

This is a unique challenge
where you have the opportunity to create & share something different and wonderful from
the little pieces of our printed fabric we call Trimmings. We are
looking for work by designers, artists, quilters, makers, tinkers, film makers,
animators, children, professionals, thinkers and YOU.

PRIZES
We have two major prizes this year, both will be chosen based on skill & creativity.

Makers' Prize$300 cash for the most innovative, beautiful, creative and well presented entry as judged by Umbrella Prints.

Quilters' Prize
To celebrate the skills of the quilting community we have $300 worth of Umbrella Prints organic fabric or product to give for the most outstanding quilt, chosen by an industry judge.

and we have ... 5 Golden Tickets
How fun will it be to find a Golden ticket in your
Trimmings packet! We will be slipping shining golden tickets into 5
lucky packets. Ticket holders receive an Umbrella Prints prize valued at
$50.

NEW Audience Prize
In order to encourage the love and sharing of all your hard work we will randomly gift a lucky person who comments & repins* with $100 worth of Umbrella Prints fabric.

*Entries are posted to this Pinterest board on June 1 - repin & comment on all your favourite Trimmings creations to be in the running to win this prize.

What can you make/do with Umbrella Prints' Trimmings?HOW DO I PARTICIPATE IN THE CHALLENGE?

Those of you who we think of as part of the Umbrella Prints family, following with us over the years on this amazing journey of designing and producing textiles which tell a story, will recognise a few Umbrella Prints classics in fresh new colours as well as some exciting new designs.

We have Brushstokes in three colours, Gold Olive, Eau de nil and Turtledove, Rosehip in Coral, Hearts in Baby Momo, Ume in Momo, Daisy Dots in HB and Baby Momo, Vintage Rose in Smokey Black and Stoneflowers in HB and Turtledove.

Friday, September 19, 2014

We have 6 new really beautiful fabrics for you - available in fat quarter packs. Its like the entree to our main course, FLOWERS which will be coming out in early Summer (or Winter for our Northern folk).

Take a look at all of our cute bundles of fat quarters over in our shop.

Thursday, June 5, 2014

This year was the 5th Umbrella Prints Trimmings Competition we can't believe how fast that has gone! Each year our little challenge/comp grows and every year it gets harder and harder to choose a winner.

What we are looking for in a winner is a unique mix of creativity, quality, story and presentation all whilst of course showing off our fabric designs and colours. Too easy! Not really!

Which leads us to this year's winner, by majority vote, which is this AMAZING weaving by Shell McClure and chosen for all of the above reasons. Whilst you have to look really closely to see our pattern designs we were all in love with the way the tiny strips of woven fabric Trimmings celebrated our colours.

To see more of Shell's woven creation and how it was made visit here. Congratulations Shell you win $500 and an Umbrella Prints product of your choice and lots of admiration for your beautiful creation!

We would love to say a big big thank you to everyone who bought Umbrella Prints Trimmings this year, to our amazing entrants who make this comp all the fun and inspiration that it is, to everyone who visited our boards and pinned and commented or just stopped by to see what's happening and to our lovely judges Luisa Brimble (Alphabet Journal) , Elise Cripe (Enjoy It), Jenni Draper (Green Magazine) and Anna Graham (Noodlehead) for your valued opinion and support.

Thanks everyone; see you soon we have lots to show you and a new fabric collection on it's way!

Umbrella Prints is so happy to open up a Quilter's prize for the first time this year. We have had some stunning quilts entered in the Trimmings Competition in the past and felt it warranted a special focus all to its own.

We were also happy to hand over the 'judging' of all of the quilts entered this year as we thought they were all beautiful in their own way and therefore terribly hard to judge! Thank you to Luisa Brimble, Anna Graham, Elise Blaha and Jenni Draper, our industry judges, for the honours!

You quilter's are amazing, so much thought and care has produced gorgeous quilts any of which we would be proud to call our own.

Last night we were up late waiting for midnight so we could count, check and take screen shots in preparation for today's announcements.

So we would first like to announce our People's Choice winner as Diana Ramirez maker of mamma190 'linen dress for Emma'!!! Decided this year by most number of individual comments on our Pinterest competition board; we found the community instantly jumping on board to love this sweet dress with Umbrella Prints Trimmings front panel.

Mamma190 captured the light feeling of our Floating World Collection fabrics in both what she made and how it was photographed. Keeping the design simple and combining natural linen worked beautifully as well!

Simple, natural, light and pretty.

Thank you mamma190 we will be posting your presents to Milan, Italy next week!